eir stiff guards behind
them; and you meet fortune-tellers, and goldsmiths, and merchants, and
philosophers, and feather-sellers, and ultra-Roman Britons, and
ultra-British Romans, and tame tribesmen pretending to be civilised, and
Jew lecturers, and--oh, everybody interesting. We young people, of
course, took no interest in politics. We had not the gout: there were
many of our age like us. We did not find life sad.

'But while we were enjoying ourselves without thinking, my sister met
the son of a magistrate in the West--and a year afterwards she was
married to him. My young brother, who was always interested in plants
and roots, met the First Doctor of a Legion from the City of the
Legions, and he decided that he would be an Army doctor. I do not think
it is a profession for a well-born man, but then--I'm not my brother. He
went to Rome to study medicine, and now he's First Doctor of a Legion in
Egypt--at Antinoe, I think, but I have not heard from him for some time.

'My eldest brother came across a Greek philosopher, and told my Father
that he intended to settle down on the estate as a farmer and a
philosopher. You see,'--the young man's eyes twinkled--'his philosopher
was a long-haired one!'

'I thought philosophers were bald,' said Una.

'Not all. She was very pretty. I don't blame him. Nothing could have
suited me better than my eldest brother's doing this, for I was only too
keen to join the Army. I had always feared I should have to stay at home
and look after the estate while my brother took _this_.'

He rapped on his great glistening shield that never seemed to be in his
way.

'So we were well contented--we young people--and we rode back to
Clausentum along the Wood Road very quietly. But when we reached home,
Aglaia, our governess, saw what had come to us. I remember her at the
door, the torch over her head, watching us climb the cliff-path from the
boat. "Aie! Aie!" she said. "Children you went away. Men and a woman you
return!" Then she kissed Mother, and Mother wept. Thus our visit to the
Waters settled our fates for each of us, Maiden.'

He rose to his feet and listened, leaning on the shield-rim.

'I think that's Dan--my brother,' said Una.

'Yes; and the Faun is with him,' he replied, as Dan with Puck stumbled
through the copse.

'We should have come sooner,' Puck called, 'but the beauties of your
native tongue, O Parnesius, have enthralled this young citizen.'

Parnesius looked bewildered